Welcome To The Hermit's Desk

Apr. 29th, 2017

Apr. 29th, 2017

I am back, after an embarrassing....no, I'm not going to call it that. A necessary 3-day stay in the psych ward again. Something I used to know when I was younger that it was okay to need help, over and over again, no matter how long it took, no longer how intensive the treatment. I need to know that again. By power of repetition, I will say this to myself until I believe it again.

The good news is that I went in before I did anything harmful to myself. The thoughts were there, the will was there, but I woke up Jesse, sobbed in his arms, and then asked him to take me to a place where I knew that I'd be safe from myself.

The last couple of times I've been in there, I've been trying to utilize the support and learning that the psych ward gives. I've been going to ALL the groups. I've been in constant contact with my Clinical Care Coordinator. I've talked openly to my nurses, to my doctor, trying the yoga, the mindful exercises, asking questions DURING group.

Because I remembered that was what it was like before. There was no single, grand revelation. There was no shining moment of the clouds parting and the angels sounding their trumpets. It was brief moments of illumination through months or years of white-knuckling it, until it all became habit. I'm trying to find concepts to explore rather than concepts to dismiss.

Concepts such as re-exploring the grieving process and learning a few new things about it. Things such as it's okay to always grieve the loss of something (such as my health or a loss of identity), so long as I work towards not living IN the grief. That acceptance can mean still experiencing sadness. That peace can still include moments of sorrow or confusion.

I'd not known that, or else I'd forgotten that.

Concepts such as applying active mindfulness through the insomnia (a thing I utilized with some effect this morning, waking up from intense and scary dreams at 3:30 AM).

I'd not known that, or else I'd forgotten that.

Concepts such as remembering how I used to heal required work, and as tired as I may be now, it is either work or resigning myself to the sixth floor every month. (As it has been since January.) Concepts that require pulling myself through the malaise, against every self-destructive instinct, and having...faith that with enough practice, IT. WILL. WORK.

Concepts such as replacing the word "hope" with "faith". Not faith in God. Not faith even in myself. But faith in the process. I've discovered over my life that be it the road of destruction or of health, that process has never failed to materialize results, depending on which way I was dashing towards.

Big concepts. Nebulous concepts. Concepts that must be broken down into smaller pieces. Borrowing from Jessica Jones, this morning I recalled, in closest detail, the four major streets I grew up near. The gas station edging Lenzer Boulevard. The house down the street that I was convinced had witches living it in, as they managed to keep their grass lawn emerald green even through blistering 120 degree summers.

And I managed to fall back asleep after that. Concepts broken into smaller pieces. Problems solved in even smaller pieces.

Like Captain Lockely said in Babylon 5, if you're in a burning building and have to jump out the window, that gives you another 2 seconds to figure out the solution to the next problem, and then another 2 seconds to figure out the NEXT problem.

I want to be able to, a year from now, meet someone in similar straits and say "Oh yeah, the year of The Red Wolf? (The latin-translation of the full medical term of lupus.) That shit was ROUGH. I totally lost my shit there for a while. I mean, REALLY lost it. But I got through it and I'm still getting through it."

That's a nebulous, large concept, littered with all kinds of problems to get through. But broken down, it just means mindfulness exercises, breathing, and yes (*SIGH*) some application of positive thinking.